Fare-register



(No Model.) 8 Sheets-Sheet 1. S. 0. HOUGHTON.

FARE REGISTER.

No. 496,688. Patented May 2, 1893.

S. O. HOUGHTON.

(No Model.) 3 Sheets-Sheet 2.

FARE REGISTER.

Patented May, 2, 1893.

(No Model.) 3 Sheets-Sheet 3.

S. G. HOUGHTON. FARE REGISTER.

No. 496,688. Patented May 2, 1893.

FWZ

UNrTEn TATES PATENT union.

STEPHEN C. HOUGHTON, OF SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA.

FARE-REGISTER.

SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 496,688, dated May 2, 1893.

Application filed August 15, 1392' Serial No. 443,134. (No model.)

To aZZ whom it may concern-.-

Be it known that I, STEPHEN CHASE HOUGH- TON, a citizen of the United States, residing in the city and county of San Francisco, State of California,have invented an Improvement in Fare-Registers; and I hereby declare the following to be afull, clear, and exact description of the same.

My invention relates to that class of fare registers in which a series of periodically rotating reading dials is operated by means of electrically actuated mechanisms operated from suitably disposed switches throughout the car.

Myinvention consists in the novel constructions, arrangements and combinations hereinafter fully described and pointed out in the claims.

The object of myinvention is to provide an accurate, compact, simple, rapid, and easily operated machine or apparatus for registering numbers for any purpose, such for example, as registering the fares collected in street railway cars. Also to provide an electrically operated registering mechanism, and particularly such a mechanism as will be adapted to make both the trip or partial or total registrations required in a machine for use upon street cars.

Referring to the accompanying drawings for a more complete explanation of myinvention,-Figure 1 is a front view, a portion of the face plate being broken away. Fig. 2 is a front elevation of the mechanism the face plate being removed. Fig. 3 is a top view. Fig. 4 is a detail of the arm H and cam slott' by which the clutch sleeves (Z and e are thrown to and from engagement to connect and disconnect the ratchet wheel E from the spindle D. Fig. 5 is an enlarged cross section showing the arrangement of parts on spindle D. Fig. 6 is a back view of my fare register. Fig. 7 is a view .of the inside of a car, showing my register in position over the car door, and an arrangement of the circuit wires and push buttons.

A is a face-plate, having sight apertures a, a, in line above and sight apertures a a a and a in line below. Behind the faceplate is the frame B consisting of separated plates connected by suitable corner posts h. Between the front plate of frame B and the face-plate Aare located the dials. There are six of these, two being in an upper row or series, and four in a lower row or series, the upper series of disks being a trip register, and the lower series a total register. The first dial of the upper series is designated by C, and it has upon its face in annular series the nine digits and the zero. Each of these characters is adapted by the rotation of the dial, to be presented in due course behind the sight aperture a of the face-plate. The second dial of the upper series is marked C and has upon its face in annular series the nine digits and the zero, said characters being adapted to be successively presented behind the sight aperture a. The first dial of the lower series is C the second 0 the third C", and the fourth C and each of these has upon its face the nine digits and the zero, adapted to be successively presented behind the sight aperture a a a and a respectively. Thus in the upper series, through the upper sight apertures a and a numbers up to and including 99 can be read, and in the lower series, through the lower line of sight apertures can be read numbers up to and including 9,999.

Dial C is fixed upon the outer end of a spindle D mounted and adapted to rotate in frame B. Its rotation is imparted through a ratchet wheel E on its inner end, with which an actuating pawl F engages. This pawl is carried by a leverfwhich is itself secured to the armature g of an electro-magnet C said armature being hinged as shown to a suitable bracket secured to frame B. f is a fulcrum forsaid lever. A retaining pawl Fcontrols the ratchet wheel E. When the magnet is energized, and its armature is thereby drawn down, the leverf islifted and through its pawl F the ratchet wheel E is turned one tooth, thereby rotating spindle D and turning dial C one number. The armature rises again through the weight of the lever and attached parts, when the electric currentceases to How through the magnet, and the pawl is thereby retracted for the next tooth.

In order to prevent the dial C from turning too far, there is connected with spindle D a stop ratchet wheel d, with which astop pawl g secured to the armature g engages.

hen the actuating pawl F is turning the spindle D the stop pawl g is thrown into the path of ratchet wheel (Z by the same movement of the armature and thus arrests the spindle at its proper limit of movement.

As before stated the device is applicable to any purpose requiring the registration or indication of numbers, simple or in combination. But for convenience/I prefer to describe its application as a fare register.

The operation of the parts, as far as described, is as follows:-The circuit wires 9 which include the magnet are to be extended in suitable courses through the car. Suitable and conveniently located switches or push buttons as shown at g in Fig. 7 willbe placed on the car whereby the circuit may be closed and opened. The register is to be located in any proper position in the car, and upon the face-plate may be arranged an inscription to indicate the trip of the car up or down. When starting, the zero of dial 0 appears behind the sight aperture Ct. Then a fare is collected the conductor momentarily closes the circuit, whereby the magnet is energized. The armature being attracted, the actuating mechanism is set in operation as before described and dial Ois turned so that its figure 1 appears behind the sight aperture 11. WVhen a second fare is collected, the operation is repeated and the figure 2 appears; and so on until figure 9 having disappeared the zero is again presented. But simultaneously with this presentment of the zero, the

figure 1. of dial 0 is presented behind the sight aperture a and the number 10 is thus read. This movement of dial 0 is accomplished as follows: Dial C is mounted upon the outer end of aspindle D which spindle also carries a disk d havingin its periphery a series of ten equidistant notches (Z Upon one side of the stop ratchet d of the first spindle D is a pin (1 which successively engages the notches d to rotate the disk d. Thus with each rotation of spindle D, the spindle D is turned one tenth of a rotation. It, therefore, results that when the number 10 is presented as before mentioned, the second dial 0 will remain stationary with its figure l appearing through aperture a, while the first dial 0 will continue to rotate when operated, presenting its several figures successively to be combined with the 1 of the second dial, up to and including the number 19. The next movement of dial 0 will present its zero again and simultaneously with this presentment the dial 0 will be turned to exhibit its figure 2 thus reading the number 20. This will continue up to and including the number 99. At the next movement the zeros of the two dials appear and thereafter the operations are repeated. In order to hold the spindle D steady and prevent it from moving too far, the periphery of its disk (1 between the notches d is concaved as shown at d to the circle of a flange rim d on the side of stop ratchet d. At the termination of atrip it is necessary to return both dials O and C to their initial points. To efd is mounted upon the spindle D bya groove and pin connection at d or other form of feather or spline, (see Fig. 5) whereby it may move longitudinally on the spindle. The stop ratchet has on one side a clutch sleeve (1 which engages the clutch sleeve e of ratchet E. On its other side'it has a sleeve 61 with a circumferential groove d made in it. Spindle D has on its end a heart shaped cam d Carried by a vertical pivot post 71 is an arm I-I having in'one end a pin it which engages the circumferential groove (Z and on the other end a horizontal pin 71. which enters a vertical slot i having an inclined foot or lower end i. This slot is made in avertically movable rod 1, held up by a spring 4?, the lower end of said rod projecting below whereby it may conveniently be pulled down.

Upon the spindle D is aheart-shaped cam d. Upon the rod I is a cross arm i with downwardly bent points i one on each end, and lying directly above the heart-shaped earns 61 and (1. (See Fig. 2.)

The operation is as follows:The spring i normally holds rodI up, so that theinclined foot t of its slot 1' holds the pivoted arm H over in such position that the stop ratchet d is forced over to maintain its clutch sleeve in normal engagement with the clutch sleeve of ratchet E. But when it is necessary to return the dials O and C to 'their initial positions, the rod I is pulled down. This has the eifect, through the inclined foot 2" of its slot 2' of moving the arm H forwardly, whereby the stop ratchet is moved forwardly on the spindle, and the engagement of its clutch sleeve with the clutch sleeve of ratchet E is broken, thus leaving the spindleD free. The further eifect of the downward movement of rod I is to carry the points 2' down into contact with the heart-shaped cams d 02 and this contact will turn said cams from whatever position they may be in to a vertical position, with the points 2' resting in their depressed centers. These cams are arranged on the spindles in such position that when turned upright the spindles and the dials they carry will be returned to initial position.

In order to provide for a continuous register, unaffected by the changes of the upper. dials and independent of trips, I have the second or supplementary series of dials which I term the total register. To the first dial 0 of the second or lower series is transmitted exactly and simultaneously and in the same direction the same movement which is im parted to the first dial 0 of the upper series. Dial O is carried by a spindle J, upon which is mounted a pinion j. Upon the clutch sleeve 6 of ratchet E above is a pinion e, and between and meshing with pinions j and e is a gear K. These intermeshing gears are equally proportioned so that for each revolution of the dial 0 above, the dial 0 below has a revolution. The intermediate gears being from ratchet E, the lower dial 0 is not affected by the returning of the upper dials to initial position as heretofore described.

Dial C is mounted on a spindle L which carries a disk Z having a series of ten equidistant notches Z in its periphery. The spindle J carries a disk j with a pin j adapted to engage the notches Z and thereby to impart to the dial 0 a one tenth rotation for every rotation of dial 0 Similarly the dials Q and C are mounted upon spindles carrying toothed disks and actuating pins, whereby each succeeding dial has imparted to it a one tenth rotation for each rotation of the preceding dial. The spindles are prevented from turning too far by means precisely the same as those described in connection with dial 0 above, namely, concave rims of their disks fitting the circle of flanges on preceding disks. From this construction it will be seen that from the figures of the second series of dials the numbers will read through the hundreds and thousands.

Upon one end of frameB is carried an electrically operated bell or gong M, having circuit wires m connected with the main circuit. In the main circuit is a contact arm m which is preferably in the form of a spring, carried by a small bracket m as shown. Secured to the swinging armature g of magnet G is a contact arm N, the end of which lies normally out of contact with the spring m. When the armature is attracted byits magnet and swings down to it, the end of the arm N is thrown into electrical contact with the spring m and the bell circuit being thus closed the bell is sounded. This, it will be observed takes place only after the armature has fully descended' and its mechanical work of operating the pawl and ratchet connection is performed, so that the full strength of the current is directed to this work, before any portion of it is called upon to operate the bell. The contact arm m being a spring will, by pressing down on arm N, assist initially in throwing the armature away from the magnet when the latter ceases to be energized, but this return is fully effected by the weighted extension f of lever f.

It will be understood that I do not confine myself to the use of dials, to indicate the readings, as other and equivalent devices and arrangements may be employed to exhibit the registrations. v

Havingthus described my invention, what I claim as new, and desire to secure by Letters Patent, is-

1. In a register, the combinationof a rotary reading dial having a spindle, a swinging lever with pawl, a ratchet loose on the dial spindle and with which the pawl engages, said ratchet having a clutch sleeve, a sliding clutch sleeve on the spindle to turn it, said sleeve having a groove, a pivoted arm engaging said groove and a vertically movable rod with a cam slot engaging the pivoted arm to swing it, to throw the clutch sleeves into and out of engagement, substantially as herein described.

2. In a register, the combination of a rotary reading dial having a spindle, a swinging lever with pawl, an electro-magnet with armature for operating said lever, a ratchet loose on the dial spindle and with which the pawl engages, said ratchet having a clutch sleeve, a sliding clutch sleeve on the spindle to turn it, said sleeve having a groove, a pivoted arm engaging said groove and a vertically movable rod with a cam slot engaging the pivoted arm to swing it, to throw the clutch sleeves into and out of engagement, substantially as herein described.

3. In a register, the combination of two rotary reading dials having separate spindles, connections between said spindles whereby a complete revolution of one imparts a partial rotation to the other, a ratchet mounted loosely on the first spindle and having a clutch sleeve, a lever and pawl for imparting movement to the ratchet, a sliding clutch sleeve on said spindle having a groove, a pivoted arm engaging said groove, a Vertically movable rod with cam groove engaging the arm for throwing the clutch sleeves into and out of engagement, the heart-shaped cams on the spindles and the arm with contact points on the movable rod, engaging said cams to return the spindles to initial position, substantially as herein described.

4:. In a register, the combination of two'rotary reading dials having separate spindles, connections between said spindles whereby a complete revolution of one imparts a partial rotation to the other, a ratchet mounted loosely on the first spindle and having a clutch sleeve, a lever and pawl for imparting movement to the ratchet, an electro-magnet and swinging armature for operating said lever and pawl, a sliding clutch sleeve on said spindle having a groove, a pivoted arm engaging said groove, a vertically movable rod with cam groove engaging the arm for throwing the clutch sleeves into and out of engagement, the heart-shaped cams on the spindles and the arm with contact points on the movable rod, engaging said cams to return the spindles to initial position, substantially as herein described.

5. A fare register consisting of an upper series of reading dials constituting a trip register, and a lower series of reading dials constituting a total register, the members of each series being connected to transmit, by the full rotation of a preceding dial, apartial rotation to a succeeding one, an electric circuit with suitable switches, an electro magnet in said circuit, a swinging armature of said magnet, a lever carried by said armature, and apawl and ratchet connection between said lever and the first dial of the trip register, a ratchet wheel loose 011 the spindle of IIO said first dial, a controllable clutch connection with said ratchet Wheel whereby the dials of the trip register may be returned to their initial point, consisting of a clutch sleeve on said loose ratchet, a sliding clutch sleeve on the spindle to turn it, said sleeve having a groove, a pivoted arm engaging said groove, and a vertically movable rod with a cam slot engaging the pivoted arm to swing it, the heart-shaped cams and the arm with contact points on the movable rod engaging said cams, intermeshin g gears between the spindle of the first dial of the total register and the eeaess STEPHEN O. HOUGHTON.

Witnesses:

S. H. NOURSE, J. A. BAYLESS. 

